


it can be sweet though incomplete though

by ninemoons42



Series: undernourished egos and rotating hips [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Modern: No Powers, Alternate Universe - Music, First Meetings, Gen, Inspired by Music, Meet-Cute, Musicians, NSFW Promptis Week 2018, Pop Pianist Noctis Lucis Caelum, Pop music, Promptis Week 2018, Song Lyrics, YouTuber Prompto Argentum, includes song lyrics created by me, just a slight one, playlist included for everyone who's interested, setup fic for the actual smutty times
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-29
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-06-27 11:10:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15684234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninemoons42/pseuds/ninemoons42
Summary: The night before the Eos Festival is also the night before Noctis Caelum's birthday, and he's feeling every single one of his years, though his friends and family are trying to make things a little bit better, a little bit easier. (All right, maybe the fish are helping too.)When he's introduced to up-and-coming YouTuber musician Prompto Argentum, it's through a cover of one of his own songs; and then an actual introduction comes up and -- he's sort of left wondering where all these feelings and yearnings are coming from.





	it can be sweet though incomplete though

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this is the AU I built for the express purpose of participating in NSFW Promptis Week, and that's gonna start at the end of the month (on Noct's birthday). 
> 
> If the ideas in this one are familiar, you might want to think of this as a remix / do-over of [the song without the words](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14925947).
> 
> First in a series: I'll be posting the actually NSFW stuff during the event week. I'm setting the stage with this one. Hope you'll all come back for the shenanigans in a couple of weeks XD
> 
> Playlist!  
> Flaws (live acoustic) -- Bastille  
> This Cowboy Song (live in Vina Del Mar) -- Sting  
> Take On Me by A-Ha -- Brooklyn Duo + Ensemble Connect  
> Centuries by Fall Out Boy -- Brooklyn Duo  
> Stay Alive -- Jose Gonzalez  
> Calling For Rain -- FFXV Kingsglaive OST  
> Love Of My Life (live from Rock Montreal) -- Queen  
> Inertia Creeps -- Massive Attack  
> Mad World by Tears For Fears -- Marius Furche  
> A Sky Full Of Stars by Coldplay -- SYMPHONIACS  
> Too Much Is Never Enough -- Florence + The Machine

Tug of fingers, hard and insistent at his sleeve and Noctis blinks, once, twice, and stops dead in the very middle of -- where _is_ he? He doesn’t even recognize the wide expanse of polished marble beneath his feet, the deep gray veins in the stone and the wandering lines of green and blue, the chips and artful inclusions catching the gold and crystal-faceted gleam from the chandeliers hanging over his head. 

Someone hurries past him in a starched-stiff uniform, silver cord and polished buttons riding their collars, and he catches a glimpse of the peaked cap and the for-show gloves and he turns at last and -- Iris is smirking at him, a little.

Okay, maybe not a little; he wonders what’s stopping her from pointing and laughing, when her grin’s enough to rival the glow from overhead. Suit jacket over that ostentatious waistcoat she likes so much, and the very short pleated skirt, the visible shorts she’s wearing, and the very heavy, very mud-splattered boots -- that last item being the only thing of hers that’s completely out of place in this gorgeous lobby, in this sparkling hotel. 

“Um,” he offers, intelligently, raking his fingers through the back of his falling-down hair. 

Iris cackles and folds her arms over her chest. “I’m guessing I have to say that all over again.”

“Time zones,” he grumbles at her. “I don’t even know what that clock over your head says right now. My brain literally does not understand the concept of time.”

“I don’t know why you can’t get used to this, how old are you anyway,” she says, but maybe there’s something gentle in her words because she stops tugging on his sleeve. Only starts walking again, towards the elevators, and she’s producing a gleaming gold key-card from her sleeve and tapping it against the panel below the numbered and labeled buttons. 

_P_ lights up on the elevator’s display and he can feel the jolt of resistance, the brief downward yank of merciless gravity on his shoulders and on his feet, and he can’t hear a single sound from the elevator cabin itself. He just feels the movement of it, the upward pressure of the floor, and when the doors open on a foyer that looks a lot like the lobby he’s just left behind, he squints, and looks back at Iris. “This your idea of a joke?”

“It’s not a joke,” she says, patiently, gently, and he sort of blesses her and sort of sighs at her. “There’s that water feature thing over there, right? So we’re not in the lobby any more. This is your floor.”

He stares some more. “Why do I get a _floor_ in this hotel? Why do I get the fucking penthouse all to myself? Why didn’t you guys just get an apartment like we usually do?”

“Out,” she says, but not in an annoyed way. “And -- you forgot we tried.”

“You did?”

“Yeah. But this hotel insisted. Everything free while you’re headlining Eos. So Ignis had to give in.” Her face softens a little more. “It’s just four days, Noct. After this you can hide for a bit.”

“So you keep telling me,” he sighs, and he does step out of the cabin then, and watches as the doors close on her and -- she still has a key-card and he doesn’t. Or at least he doesn’t feel the weight of it in any of his pockets, and he’s got quite a few of those, and he fumbles for his phone and swipes his thumb across the screen instead.

Missed notifications blink at him and he swipes out several of them -- leaves only one email that’s already been pre-marked as important -- and now he crosses to the water feature that Iris had pointed out to him.

Peaceful slow shift of blue and green light, glittering upwards and out of the rippling surface, alive with movement. Calming smell of wet leaves and vines, and below the surface he catches a glimpse of languid fin-flip, and he holds his breath a little, waiting for the fish to emerge, and it’s beautiful when it does: white scales and the pattern of red and black that looks weird because it looks like it’s been painted on and yet it’s still the natural coloration of the fish. The body of it, longer than his arm, and the streaming veils of its tail. The bright eyes, the rhythmic gape of its mouth, and he looks around for something to feed it with -- and spots the glass jar full of red and brown and green pellets on a nearby table.

He throws a few pellets in and the fish rises nearly to his fingertips, eager for a meal -- and he laughs when the second and the third and the fourth fish glide out of the shadows of the water feature, out from the edges, and he feeds them a little more, just enough for them to see him and maybe remember him so they can greet him next time, and then he hums a sort of nonsense melody at the fish as they swim away.

He doesn’t mind. He still has that one email to read anyway, and he swipes to it and keeps on humming.

 _Here’s the thing about time zones, love,_ the message begins. _I know, I know, you’re going to complain about them and I would normally let you go on but first, because you’re several time zones behind me, let me be the first to say “Happy birthday”. Happy birthday, my dearest, my love, my son. Mother loves you and misses you. I’m doing well here at the hospital; in fact the doctor came in this morning and said they just want to monitor me for a few more days to make sure I’ve got no other problems to deal with before they even appear. Otherwise the numbers are all looking good. When you’re my age you’ll look forward to hospital people telling you there’s nothing wrong with you and to please go home and be healthy. I don’t like that they’ve added a few more pills to the list of things I’m already taking, like the box I have isn’t already full? -- but that’s just the usual kvetching. You don’t have to sit through that from your mother. Anyway, please have fun and break a leg, at the music festival. I don’t know if I’ll have enough Internet to catch at least one of your performances, but -- I’m cheering you on, you know that, right?_

One long complicated paragraph jumping from topic to topic, and he tears up and laughs outright when the single attachment opens on a poorly-lit selfie in the washed-out beige of a hospital bed, his mother making a horrible face at her phone, and her hair pulled unflatteringly away from her forehead and her cheeks. 

So he takes photos of the fish as they swim back and forth in their slow circuits, and sends that as the first part of his response.

The other part is -- he opens the voice recorder app and sings a few lines from one of her favorite songs: 

_Devil to pay on judgment day_  
_Would Jesus strike me down if I should pray?_  
_This cowboy song is all I know to bring you back into my arms_  
_Your distant sun your shining light you’ll be my dog star shining tonight_

“Thanks mom. I mean, for everything. Love you,” he adds, near the end of the clip.

He’s just finished sending off his email and its attachments and then his phone pings at him again, and he blinks because how can Aulea have responded so quickly?

But it’s not Aulea; it’s Lunafreya, on one of his private messaging apps. Slapdash words.

_I just found this link now and -- don’t respond, I won’t be able to explain because I have to turn this thing off, we’re landing in half an hour -- but I found this and I listened to it five times in a row and why don’t you check it out?_

The link opens to a blog post and -- Noctis feels his eyebrows go up a little, feels the tiny niggling edge of interest in his skin, even though he shouldn’t.

Beneath the video and the blue circle of the stream being loaded is the text “[Cover] _Throne of Regrets_ ”, and Noctis shakes his head a little, and mutters, “The fuck, Lu?”

Voice on the video before there’s any kind of image appearing: “Yeah, yeah, I’m not original, everyone else did this a year ago and my only excuse is, I didn’t start listening to this album until literally tonight. And I only listened to it once and now I’m doing this. I’m an idiot, right?”

Flick of lights being switched on, hiss of feedback and breath against a microphone, and Noctis recognizes the face immediately -- and doesn’t recognize the intro to his own song, not when it’s rendered in a complicated stormy progression of recorded distorted violins.

That voice, covering his song. On his screen is Prompto Argentum, performer and producer of every single cover posted to the video channel _quicksilver-kweh_. 

A wild shock of blond hair that’s sticking up in all the directions that Noctis can think of, and probably some that he’s never even imagined, and he’s torn between deciding whether Prompto just rolled out of bed or actually has styled his hair to look that way. Either way, he’s lovely, even with the harsh loop-light that catches like flares, like torches, in the vivid blue-violet of his irises. Freckles scattered like stippled shadows, like reversed star-patterns, in his cheeks and over the bridge of his nose and at his temples. 

Prompto is holding his closed hand up to his camera, and for a moment Noctis is thrown back to -- was it the day before yesterday? Whatever. He remembers Iris and Talcott and Dino talking about a bar-code tattoo, about the meanings of the letters and numbers impressed into skin, and he’d only seen the tattoo without the context of the person wearing it, and now the ink draws his eyes. Letters and numbers and those strange and familiar bars in their various thicknesses. What can it possibly mean? What does it mean to Prompto?

Who, on screen, flicks his fingers in sequence: little finger, ring finger, middle finger -- and then he turns his hand to show a quick thumbs-up and he begins to sing.

It’s Noctis’s own song and it’s not, because he’d normally drop his voice into its lower register to go with the mournful words.

_Blink of years gone by, blink and the tears fall from my eyes,_  
_And everyone I know is behind me and I’m all alone, I’m on my feet_  
_Don’t let me fall now, don’t let me fail now, o my fearful heart._  
_I told them I’d made my peace. With them, I did; but I have no peace of my own._  
_Don’t let me be afraid. Don’t leave me alone. Here is the altar. Here is the throne._  
_Let me carry a memory, just one, to remember my life by._

Prompto sings like he’s actively fighting not to cry, and even then his breath runs up short in mid-verse, in mid-refrain, and he takes an actual break after the second chorus and scrubs his ragged sleeve over his eyes -- and then his voice soars back into the song and Noctis, hunched over his phone, is shaking with sharp emotion.

He sings like an angel who’s been released from its choir, wistful and powerful and so very vulnerable.

And Noctis watches the video three times in rapid succession and then he fires off a series of questions: _What the hell, Lu, how did he do the thing? I couldn’t stop watching him. Have you met him? Is he actually that pretty in real life? How come Iris knows about him, how come you know about him, and I don’t?_

And then his phone rings and he almost drops it onto the silver-scaled fish, but he fumbles to answer and mutters, “Hello?”

“Happy birthday to you too,” and it’s Lunafreya, sweetly mocking. “How did I know you’d be woken up by that thing I sent you?”

“Oh. Thanks. I haven’t actually slept yet,” he mutters. Looks at his watch and, yes, the second hand is sweeping past midnight and the date has rolled over on the little window, which now shows the number 30. “Land safe?”

“Yeah. I’m on my way. Got you some takeout, too, don’t tell Ignis,” she says.

“Please tell me you got extra sauce for the fries.”

“I did, idiot, how long have we been doing this?” She’s laughing at him and he can’t help but snort in response. “Wait, give me a moment, my ride’s here. Good evening,” she’s saying, probably not to him. “Or good morning. Whatever. Noctis?”

“I’m here,” he says. “I’m not okay. That thing you sent me? What the actual flying fuck?”

“Aww, I can hear your crush from here,” she laughs.

“Which is your fault since I was going to go to sleep and then you did this to me.”

“Okay, yeah, I did that, and I’m not even sorry.” But she sighs, afterwards, and he blinks and looks at his phone and he presses it back to his ear. “I heard he was supposed to attend Eos, and that’s about it.”

He blinks. “Wait, what, attend? He’s going to be in -- the audience? Why isn’t he going to be on any of the stages?”

“I have no idea,” she says.

“Who do I need to talk to, so he can get a set of his own?”

“Nice of you to ask, but before you do anything rash, maybe you need to think about it from his point of view.”

He raises an eyebrow even though there’s no one there to see him. “Which is?”

“What if he doesn’t want to be a performer? What if he just wants to watch everyone else?”

“Okay,” he says, and he thinks that over. “Okay. Yeah. Smart of him. I wish I wasn’t headlining this thing, I don’t need that pressure. I’d rather be in the audience. But, Lu, wait.”

“Yeah?”

“I want to meet him,” he says, and he has no idea why he says it out loud.

“You and me and about half your entourage,” she laughs. “Maybe if he does make it we can let him know he’s got an invite to your sets. I can do it discreetly. So can Ignis. You good with that?”

“Yeah,” he says. “That sounds pretty good, actually.”

“I’m a genius,” she says, and then: “Let me get checked in and I’ll come up to you.”

“I’m hungry,” he says, just to hear her laugh.

“Yeah, yeah, I know you are, so am I.”

He’s just bookmarking Prompto’s channel when he hears the chime for the elevator, and he turns toward the doors, expecting one person and several sacks of greasy fast food and he nearly jumps out of his skin when what he hears is: 

“Surprise!”

Ignis’s grin, warm and wide over a large plastic tub of brownies piled together and liberally spiked with lit candles. Talcott and Dino, singing in their horrendously off-key voices. Iris and Gladio and armfuls of lovely fragrant flowers. Nyx and Libertus and Crowe around one of the hotel’s luggage carts, and they’re laden with gift-wrapped boxes and at least a dozen six-packs of beer that he can see. 

“Here,” Lunafreya says, laughing as she hurries past him -- through a set of open doors and to the head of a long table. “I couldn’t get enough burgers and fries for everyone.”

“So what are you guys gonna eat?” he says, and he can feel the heat rising in his face but he can’t stop smiling either. Not when Ignis is catching him up in a hug; not when Iris is ruffling his hair; not when Gladio is fist-bumping him hard enough to almost bruise.

“Room service is coming up,” she says. 

“Happy birthday to you,” the others sing, again, hoisting their drinks over his head.

And he grins and covers his face and says, “Thanks guys. Thanks so much. I really wasn’t expecting this. I mean, we’re onstage in the afternoon and all. Don’t you guys need to sleep? Why are you drinking? But -- wow. Yeah. Thank you for this. You’re all amazing and -- you’re the best, all of you.”

Ignis passes him a brownie with a candle and he laughs before he blows the little flame out -- and the others cheer, and he shakes his head and opens his arms wide. “Group hug?”

“Yeah!”

And when he yawns, when he slips back out past the water feature and into the actual master’s bedroom, no one says anything or even tries to stop him, and for that he’s grateful: no one minds that he eats in the bed and scatters crumbs everywhere -- cheeseburger and soggy fries and brownies and one single can of lukewarm beer.

He’s careful not to get any dirt on Iris’s gift. Soft fluffy fleece in various shapes of pastel green: it’s a blanket larger than he can wrap around his shoulders, and it smells almost like the apartment that he hasn’t actually been in, in three months.

**

He almost wakes up a little past noon: there’s some kind of music playing close to his ear and it’s the farthest thing in the world from the usual loud shriek of his alarm tones, and it’s nice enough and also strange enough that he makes himself get up and look for his phone.

New upload to _quicksilver-kweh_ : and he doesn’t remember leaving the video app on, but he’s not complaining, and he sits up in the middle of his pillows and his new favorite blanket, and clicks back to the beginning of the video.

“Hi guys. Um. Wasn’t expecting to be here, but -- well, here I am,” and there’s a rasp in Prompto Argentum’s voice that catches Noctis’s attention. That makes him lean in and listen. “I hate red-eyes. Please don’t make me do that ever again. But yeah. Looks like I made it to Eos and -- I know what you’re all going to say in the comments so let me get ahead of all of you and say, if I’m going to do the thing, I promise you’ll know, and I promise I’ll stream it. Okay? Okay. Now. Song. I had this thing I was going to cover and I can’t remember where I saved the damn file. What’s wrong with me? Lose my own head next -- ”

Maybe Noctis laughs, a little, watching as Prompto disappears from view, and when he comes back his hair is even more wildly ruffled, and the low golden sunshine makes him glow -- and he’s holding a violin, he’s twirling the bow in his hand like it’s a baton.

Oh. The loops and samples from last night’s cover suddenly make sense in Noctis’s head. 

Onscreen, Prompto says, “Clearly I found what I was looking for. Okay, okay. You guys ready for this?” 

Bow in position, slow sweet rising notes, and he sings:

_Well the way I feel is the way I write_  
_It isn’t like the thoughts of the man who lies_  
_There is a truth and it’s on our side_  
_Dawn is coming, open your eyes_  
_Look into the sun as the new days rise_

Noctis is caught and pinned on the contrast of him, the details of him: the rough voice, the silky melody, the light catching on the strings, the sway of his shoulders as he falls into the refrain and lets the violin sing out loud, as he creates the music that had woken Noctis up.

“See you soon, Eos Festival,” Prompto says, and then he’s reaching out to the camera and the video ends.

And Noctis is left trying to exhale. Trying to figure out the odd knot of sharp emotion that’s gotten caught beneath his heart. 

He knows what a crush feels like and he knows what attraction is -- he’s no stranger to either -- but this feels like something different. This feels like something he could share with the boy in the video, caged in the confines of his smartphone. A sense of being unmoored, of being in a boat with all its ropes and lines and cables cut so it’s drifting and aimless and set into the wild. Boats are -- safe spaces, except when they’ve been cast out onto an empty sea, and he even knows that one from his nightmares, from long-ago salt-scarred experience.

What is he feeling now? A strange kind of hope, a strange kind of kinship: and it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense because he’s only seen two of Prompto’s videos, and he has no time to watch any of the others. 

Why does he feel this way, and why does he think he can pinpoint those feelings so precisely, and -- why is he pinning all these feelings on Prompto anyway? On a total stranger, easy on the eyes though he might be -- still a stranger, still a completely unknown quantity.

That’s not fair to him, is it?

And there’s no time for answers, either, because his phone blares again, and this time it’s the alarm tones and he rolls his eyes, and forces himself to begin his day.

“What was that you were humming?” Ignis asks, later, while they’re all hip-deep in the middle of sound checks. “It sounded familiar.”

Noctis makes a face at him. “Sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing? I thought it was decent.”

“You think so?” And Noctis sits back down at the piano. Quick search online for sheet music and then the chords are flowing easily from his fingertips, and he sings the verses that Prompto had skipped over, and he’s maybe a little bit aware that the world’s still turning obliviously around him, but he’s happy to get lost in the music and then Ignis is sitting beside him. Never to crowd him in. He’s good, he’s a voice to sing harmony with, he’s someone to lean into.

“Still don’t get why you quit,” he teases, gently, after they’ve run through the entirety of “Stay Alive”.

“My voice takes too much looking after; I’d rather -- do as that song says, actually.” Ignis is chuckling, softly, and Noctis shakes his head and punches him very lightly in the upper arm. “I’d rather live.”

“Oh, so you think _I’m_ not alive? Harsh.”

“One, I didn’t say that; you did. Two, you can always get out, yourself.”

“Eventually,” and Noctis shrugs and grins and follows him backstage so he can get dressed.

He runs his thumbs over his cufflinks, in the quiet of the moment where he’s staring at himself in the full-length mirror in his tiny dressing room. Wings in black and silver enamel, chased details and a little damage around the edges because these are the cufflinks his mother had given him on his 21st birthday, and they’ve traveled around the world with him, several times over, and they’re a little fragile now and he’s only going to wear them on this first night of the festival. Tomorrow he’ll wear something else; tonight, since Aulea can’t be here and may not be able to watch, he’ll have these, and the presence of her by his side.

At the very last moment he says, “Fuck it,” and he turns back to the small kit of makeup things on the table. Sharp point of the eyeliner that glides along his skin and leaves vibrant trails of glitter and teal behind. 

Nothing to be done for his stubble, for his hair that’s growing too slowly for his tastes. He can only scrape the ends of it away from his ears, from his cheeks. He redoes the knot in his tie for the last time and steps out the door, and:

“Noct!”

“What are you all doing there, I thought we were doing a show in like fifteen minutes,” he asks, and then the words all trail off because he can see who they’re all clustered around. 

“There you are!” Lunafreya says, and she’s grinning exactly like the cat who got all the canaries and all the fish besides, and she sounds entirely too happy. “Look who Gladio found in the front row!”

“Um hi help?”

“What the -- guys, are you actively trying to scare the shit out of him? Back off,” and Crowe laughs right in his face and he closes the distance to Prompto Argentum in just a few steps. Hand out in an offer of help, or maybe just to shake. Manners that Aulea had drilled into him. “Hello. Prompto, right? Please excuse my -- my friends, okay they’re not my friends, they’re annoying,” and he grimaces at the others and especially at the smirk that Lunafreya’s still wearing.

Even Ignis coughs out a small laugh, and Noctis levels a glare at him.

“They’re -- not annoying. I was just surprised. Noctis.” 

And hard on the heels of his name out of that lovely mouth -- Prompto catches at his hand.

Noctis nearly gasps at the warmth of his skin. Rough edges of calluses, which he’d almost expected. 

What is entirely new are the constellations of freckles on the backs of his hands.

How he manages to notice those when he’s quickly towing Prompto away from the others’ grins, he doesn’t know: maybe he’s just too worked up for some reason? Stage nerves? He can hear the hitch in Prompto’s breathing, and that’s more than enough cue for him to slow down and -- oh, he’s back in his dressing room. 

“Sorry about that. And seriously, sorry about the guys. I swear I’m going to kick all their asses. They’re all supposed to be better than that -- they spend enough time yelling at me about being rude and shit. You wanna sit for a minute?” 

“Yeah, thanks, but -- ”

His hand is being shaken.

His fingers are still interlaced with Prompto’s.

He stares at their fingers, fitted together like they’ve been doing this all their lives, and he only wishes he could take a picture -- and he smiles and tries to let Prompto go, as gracefully as he can.

Maybe he’s not imagining the red tinge around Prompto’s ears.

He knows he’s not imagining Prompto’s eyes on him, because he’s staring right back in the mirrors.

“You know your eyeliner’s lopsided?” Prompto offers, after a moment, and he’s pointing to his own right eye. “Too thin on this side.”

And Noctis throws his head back and laughs. “Pretty sure I didn’t mean that. But leave it. Wouldn’t be me otherwise.”

“Okay, we’ll leave it, we have to be able to recognize you,” and Prompto chuckles, and Noctis wants to listen to that sound forever.

“But if you’re offering to help,” he begins.

“Hey, Noctis.” Another interruption: drawl at the door, sweet slow syllables. Lush blonde curls, prettily shredded hems on a little blue dress, silver toothed-gear shapes pinned onto her sleeves. Gleam of her leather jacket, battered and creased and hanging so easily from her shoulders. “Been looking for you all over. You’re gonna be late in -- oh, two minutes?”

“Hi Cindy. Um. Right,” and Noctis thinks he might finally be too old to shuffle his feet, and he doesn’t, but only just. “I’ll be right out, just -- ”

“Three minutes,” she says, kindly. And she turns, and adds: “You’re that guy, right? You do those amazing covers -- Prompto? I’m Cindy Aurum.”

Noctis watches as Prompto waves from the safety of the chair. “Prompto Argentum, yeah. Um. Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise. If you want to be on the program for next year -- come talk to me, okay?”

And she’s gone, click of her receding steps, and Noctis grins and shakes his head and turns back to Prompto. “That went well.”

“Did she really just invite me to Eos Festival? Next year’s Eos Festival?” Prompto is wide-eyed and all but dancing, still sitting. “I -- I don’t know what to say!”

“Send her an email, say thanks, and tell her what you think you might play next year,” Noctis says.

“I was only thinking about this year. About this show. Wanted to watch you,” Prompto is saying. Is looking at him, prettily flushed, head tipped a little to the left. “I’m a fan of yours or I wouldn’t even have tried to get into this whole thing in the first place.”

“That’s kinda embarrassing because -- I started following you only literally yesterday,” Noctis says, laughing at himself, a little. “You covered my song. And my friend sent me the link and I watched your cover and I felt like I wanted to cry. That was all last night, by the way. Is that enough to make me a fan?”

“What?” It’s almost a squeak, and then Prompto’s covering his face and laughing softly. “Oh my gods. I just did that one on impulse. Okay, maybe it wasn’t an impulse, it’s a damn good song, it made me cry the first time I heard it.”

“Then we’re even,” and Noctis bows his head to try and hide his smile. “Oh, and thanks. My mother and I wrote the song together. She just didn’t want to be credited.”

“That makes it even better -- but oh, don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone what you just said.”

“It’s not a secret at all,” and reluctantly, Noctis moves for the door: he wants to stay here and keep the conversation going, or the lack of it, or whatever Prompto wants to do. But the three minutes are almost up and he’s still got this first show of the festival to get through, and he doesn’t want to be late. 

“I can have somebody get you back to the front row, if you want,” he adds, just as Prompto’s getting to his feet. “I mean, if you still want to see this thing I’m gonna do.”

“I do, I really do,” is the nearly instant response. “But I don’t want to be a bother to anybody. The guys you’re with, they’ve all got their shit to do, too.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” he says. “So. Alternative. Backstage. Want to watch from there?”

“I’ve -- kind of never done that before,” Prompto says, wide-eyed. “Are you serious though?”

“Dead,” Noctis says.

“Then, yeah, yeah, tell me where to stand and -- I swear, I won’t get in anyone’s way.”

“You’ll be fine,” and again those manners come up when he offers his arm, almost unthinkingly -- 

Prompto doesn’t take it, but he presses up against his shoulder instead and Noctis grins, shakes his head a little. Pretends he doesn’t want to lean in even closer, and sets off and -- Prompto walks so easily and so naturally at his side and he’s such a warm presence. 

He could watch that eager curiosity sparking to life in Prompto’s eyes for -- a good long time -- but by definition it’s a short walk, ending right in the wings of the stage, and Noctis’s actual piano is positioned underneath the spotlights, upright gleam and scratch, the back panel plastered with cracking and peeling stickers. Gently yellowed keys and the polished padded bench -- which Noctis picks up, and he sets it down next to a set of struts, behind a heavy set of curtain-panels. “Here you go,” he says, in Prompto’s direction. 

“That’s your damn piano bench.” Wide eyes are a lovely look on him. “What the fuck are you doing.”

“It is, and I don’t want to use it. I’ll stand. I don’t mind.”

“You’re gonna have a hard time though!” Rough fingertips catching his sleeve, again. “Not that it wouldn’t be nice to sit. But please, please, take the bench, I’ll stand here, I’ll cheer for you, I honestly would rather stand.”

He laughs, a little. Tips his head. Offers a small smile. “You sure?”

“One thousand percent sure.” Again that flick of a thumbs-up in response, graceful movement of Prompto’s fingers and wrist. 

“Okay then. I’ll take the bench. I just hope I don’t look like an idiot in your eyes, after today.”

“I said I’d never watched from backstage before, I didn’t say I hadn’t watched your other concert things,” is the response, woven in with a soft laugh. “And right now I’m just grateful to be here. If I’m even luckier, you’ll sing my favorite of your songs.”

He shakes his head, and grins, and he’s almost leaning towards Prompto, he thinks, and that’s not something he’s ever felt an impulse towards before. “Which is what?”

“Not telling you, you’re gonna have to guess,” Prompto says, smirk and all.

And Noctis rolls his eyes and laughs and steps out onto the stage, and even as he turns toward the applause and the rising chant of the crowd he still can’t stop glancing at the wings, at Prompto next to a pile of crates, leaning back to watch. 

(At the end of the night Prompto’s hand finds his and -- doesn’t quite let go, and he can’t find it in himself to object -- how could he, with Prompto’s beautiful face wreathed in euphoria, in soft shadows? So he draws Prompto closer, pulls him behind a towering stack of amps -- tastes the sweetness of his kiss -- )

**Author's Note:**

> Come talk to me on Tumblr at my FFXV sideblog [@ninemoons42-lestallumhaven](http://ninemoons42-lestallumhaven.tumblr.com/) or at my main [@ninemoons42](http://ninemoons42.tumblr.com/)!


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